Snuff-manufacturing has in some cases been attended with considerable affluence. One instance is the London manufacturer already mentioned, whose profits accumulated to the extent of nearly a quarter of a million; another is the Lundy Foote business, and the third a Scotch manufacturer (Gillespie), who by the way, practised a bit of benevolence, in the shape of building an hospital, in return for the good things fortune had sent him. Of course an hospital, like many other things, may have a doubtful origin, as witness the famous Guy's, which stands as a lasting monument to the wonderful profits that used to be made out of the iniquitous advance note system. But we do not by any means wish to make comparisons which must be odious and although the profits of snuff-manufacturing are for a variety of reasons—amongst others the decreased consumption of the manufactured article—not nearly as large as they were fifty years ago; yet we are sure that the fortunes accumulated by some of the old snuff-makers were the result of honest, upright industry.

Of European tobacco used in the manufacture of snuff that of Holland and France (St. Omer) is considered to be equal to any grown in Europe. Of the varieties grown in America, Virginia leaf is used quite extensively for some grades of snuff and "good stout rich snuff leaf" commands excellent prices and meets with a ready sale.

A writer gives the following account of the love the Terra Del Fuegians have for tobacco.

"This morning we were up early, a large party going ashore for various scientific purposes, and the others taking the ship out in the channel to do a little dredging; both parties were very successful, and added much to our collection. As we on the shore were about ready to come off, we were visited by a party of Fuegians, five men, four women, and nine children, with three dogs. They came in an English-built boat, stolen or lost from some English ship. The men and dogs landed and came towards us with a great frankness of manner. They could talk neither English nor Spanish, except the few words, boat, fire, tobac, galleto, arco. But they understood the imperial manner of one of our officers, who said quietly but firmly, 'keep back those dogs,' and immediately drove back the barking curs with sticks and stones. They warmed themselves at our fire, and seemed disposed to be very civil and friendly. We gave them our remaining biscuit, and what little tobacco there was in our party to spare. One of them accepted a pinch of snuff and pretended to sneeze, crying 'Hatchee!' with mock solemnity.



An old man sat down on a stone and sang to us a low, sweet recitation, or chant, in wild key, or mode, ending on a rising melody with each stanza.

They followed us to the ship, and we gave them some calico and beads, and tobacco, and also bought bows and arrows, and a sea-urchin, paying them in tobacco. They clung to the ship as we got under way, men and women, crying, 'Tobacco!' and frantic to catch any fragment of the precious weed thrown to them. But at length they let go, and we left the bay with the cry of tobacco ringing in our ears."

Having spoken of most of the modes of using snuff in both the Old and New World, we come now to a description of using snuff at the South, known as "dipping," and by some as "rubbing," both terms used to denote the same manner of use. The description of it as given by A. L. Adams is as follows:—

"In the South, and more especially in Virginia, where tobacco has been cultivated for more than two hundred and fifty years, and where a few pounds of it was the legitimate price for a wife, it is not surprising that it should be more highly prized and come into more general use than in any other section of our country. On the banks of the James River it was first successfully cultivated by the English colony, and this simple fact alone must forever throw a charm around it, which will foster the pride of the Virginian who has any respect for his ancestry, and hold him under sacred obligations to use, cherish, and defend the plant and its use—all of which he regards as no less a pleasure than a duty. Here too its many virtues were first discovered, and its soothing effects first felt and appreciated.

"To the old Virginian it is indeed a cherished weed, charming all manner of diseases, comforting in sorrow, soothing the ills of life, and preserving to a good old age and in a happy frame of mind all who use it. He believes in its superior virtues, and ascribes to it more good qualities than to any other known plant. He always carries it about with him, and if perchance he gets out he is truly miserable. He not only loves but worships it as a cure all. His wife and daughters know its virtues full well, and use it with equal grace and relish, believing it gives a lustre to the eye and a freshness to the cheek rarely surpassed. Among the variety of ways in which it is used none attracted my attention so much as the novel manner of snuff-taking in various parts of Virginia, West Virginia, the Carolinas and Georgia.

"In some localities the practice is unknown, while in many others it is very common. I first discovered young ladies putting snuff into their mouths as if eating it, when my curiosity was excited to an alarming extent, but on being invited to 'dip' with them I soon learned that they were not eating, but 'rubbing and chewing' it, as they called it, and in such a lively manner as to soon convince me that they appreciated it. I found the habit to be quite common even among the young of both sexes—all indulging in it as if it afforded real satisfaction to the appetite for tobacco in some form.

"The young ladies however seemed the more attached to the 'rubbing process,' as it has been appropriately styled, and defended it with equal logic and grace whenever it was assailed. The young gentlemen when in the society of the young ladies generally join them in this unique use of snuff, as they are always sure to be invited and urged if they decline, and to merit their favor of course they must appear social. I believe, in credit to their taste, however, that they really prefer a good cigar, and think it more in keeping with their ideas of manhood and neatness. I have seen young girls of ten 'rubbing and chewing,' as if they appreciated it as much as mother Eve did the apple in the garden of paradise.

"I have also seen old ladies with trembling limbs and few teeth 'rubbing and chewing,' as if it made them feel young again. I have frequently been ushered unexpectedly into the presence of young ladies, and found them puffing their cigarettes in a manner that convinced me that they knew how to smoke. There is nothing that will more surely and quickly bring a stranger into the fellowship and good graces of the ladies than to join them in their pet habit of snuff-rubbing. It seems to form a bond of friendship which they regard as sacred as the vows of wedlock.

"The older matrons 'rub' less and smoke more, which is in accordance with nature and philosophy: The older we grow the more we smoke. They find solid pleasure in sitting by the open grate after tea with fifteen inches of pipe's tail between their teeth, and slowly but gracefully puffing the perfumes of the exhilarating weed into the room, and watching with childish pleasure the hazy curling wreaths of smoke as they gently float around, changing in form and color until they finally disappear up the chimney, affording rich themes for meditation and profitable study, and perhaps suggestive of earlier days when grandmother, an innocent, blooming maid, was exchanged for the weed, the seed of which produced the plant she is now burning. Everywhere I marked only pleasant and soothing effects from the use of tobacco.

"The planter is never more indifferent to the ills of life and in sympathy with good feeling and pleasure, than when he sits down after dinner in his vine-thatched portico and lights his pipe, passing to his guests pipes, cigars, and tobacco in various forms, leaving them to choose their favorite mode of using it. Sambo is never more contented than when he burns the weed in a cob pipe, and draws the delicious smoke through an elder sprig or mullen stem. But the maid is happiest of all when with her lover she sits face to face, and they 'dip' together from the same magic plant—tobacco.

"In every walk of life throughout the sunny South tobacco in some form may be found, and its effects are always the same, whether drawn from the pocket of the beggar or taken with gloved fingers from the golden tobacco-box of the planter. For snuff the ladies have very nice round boxes with lids which, they always carry with them full of black snuff highly but pleasantly flavored. They also carry little brushes or sticks about three inches long with pliable ends; these they wet in the mouth, then dip into the snuff-box, and then place it in the mouth outside of the gums and rub earnestly for two or three minutes. 'Will you dip with me?' is the usual way of putting the invitation, when the box is drawn from the pocket and rapped slightly on the cover, sometimes by all present, who thus signify their readiness to 'dip,' then it is repassed open to all, and the 'dipping and rubbing' begins in earnest.



"The only advantage I ever discovered in this unnatural way of snuffing is in avoiding all unpleasant sneezing which snuffing is sure to produce, although it is claimed that it whitens and preserves the teeth and sweetens the mouth, and produces a beneficial effect on the lungs, all of which is true or not, just as you choose to believe. 'Will you dip and rub with me?' said one of the prettiest belles of Winchester, and in another city in another state the daughter of an ex-governor, handing me a silver-tipped brush and opening a rose-wood snuff-box richly inlaid with gold, politely asked me to 'dip' with her, expressing the belief that friendship would always follow. I have frequently been asked by ladies when travelling through the country and stopping at farm-houses, if I used tobacco—as a hint to offer them some, and it was a pleasure to comply, and receive the thankful smile of an appreciative heart."



In other parts of the country the habit of snuff-taking is confined principally to old ladies, who use any kind, either black or yellow, and who prefer themselves the cheaper kinds. But few varieties are used, and there seems to be but little taste manifested in the selection of the "dust." Foreign varieties are used only to a limited extent, being chiefly confined to those of transatlantic birth and tastes. The custom of chewing and smoking seems to be more popular with the male sex than snuff-taking, and one rarely finds a man addicted to the latter habit, unless it be one somewhat advanced in years.

Stewart in his admirable paper on snuff gives much useful information in regard to the universal custom of using it as well as its origin and distinguished uses of the great sternutatory.

"The luckless fate of inventors and originators has become proverbial, but the ingenious individual whose nostrils rejoiced in the first pinch of snuff stood in no need of the niggardly praise of contemporaries or the lavish gratitude of posterity. That first 'pinch' was its own priceless reward, far above present appreciation or future fame. What matters it, that his great name has not been reverently handed down to us: that posterity seeks in vain his honored tomb, on which to hang her grateful votive wreath; that zealous antiquaries have raised up innumerable pretenders to his unclaimed honors, and striven to rob him of his fame? Enough for that lucky inventor, wherever he may rest, that he enjoyed in his lifetime the reward for which ordinary benefactors of their kind are fain to look to the future.

"It is perfectly vain to attempt now to penetrate into the mystery which envelopes the name and nation of the first snuff-taker: long before rough, noble-hearted Drake cured his dyspepsia by the use of tobacco, or Raleigh transplanted some roots of that precious weed into English soil, there were European noses which had rejoiced at its pulverized leaves. Conjecture, lost in the mazy distance, gladly lays hold of something substantial in the shape of snuff's first royal patron. This was Catherine de Medicis, who, receiving some seeds of the tobacco plant from a Dutch colony, cherished them, and elevated the dried and pounded leaves into a royal medicine, with the proud title of 'Herbe a la Reine.' For in the beginning men took snuff, not as an everyday luxury, but as a medicament. Like tea—which a hundred years later was advertised as a cure for every ill—the new sneezing powder was hailed a universal specific; and so pleasant in its operation, that mankind, acting upon the wholesome aphorism that prevention is much better than cure, and eagerly anticipated the disease it was supposed to remedy."

"The use of 'the pungent grains of titillating dust' received a somewhat heavy and discouraging blow from an unexpected quarter. That ubiquitous power which hurled anathemas alike at the heresies of Luther and the length of clerical wigs, discountenanced its use, and at length fairly lost its temper in the contest with snuff. Whether from a prescience of the beneficial influence it was destined to exert upon mankind, or from a suspicion of its power of sharpening intellects, it is difficult to say; but Popes Urban VIII., and Innocent waged quite a miniature crusade against snuff, anathematizing those who should use it in any church, and positively threatening with excommunication all impious persons who should provoke a profane sneeze within the sacred precincts of St. Peter's pile; Louis XIV., that good son of the Church, filially complied with the paternal injunction, but his courtiers were less yielding; and the ante-chamber of Versailles frequently resounded with the effects of the pleasant stimulant.

"All persecution has a distinct tendency to establish the object of its hate, and so it was with the subject of our article—it only required to be loved; and I do not doubt that, had circumstances required them, snuff would have found its martyrs. Its use was not general in England until Charles II. introduced it, upon his return from exile, with other important fashions. It had been known and used before, as had the periwig, but it was not until his reign that it became common. When the Stuarts relieved the country of their presence for the second and last time, it had become firmly established; and, by the days of good Queen Anne, was such a necessary of life, that there were in the metropolis alone no less than seven thousand shops where the snuff-boxes of the Londoners could be replenished.

"At that time, indeed, gallants were as proud of their jewelled boxes of amber, porcelain, ebony and agate as they were of their flowing wigs and clouded canes, the handles of which were not unfrequently constructed to hold the cherished dust. We are told by courtly Dick Steel, that a handsome snuff-box was as much an essential of 'the fine gentleman' as his gilt chariot, diamond ring, and brocade sword-knot. We know them to have been manufactured of the costliest material, heavy with gold and brilliant with jewels, as they needed to be when their masters carried wigs 'high on the shoulder in a basket borne,' worth forty or fifty guineas, and wore enough Flanders lace upon their persons to have stocked a milliner's stall in New England.

"Unfortunately, but very naturally, this extravagance rendered snuff a butt for the wits (who all took it, by the way), to shoot at. Steele, whose weakness for dress and show were proverbial, levelled many of his blunt shafts at its use; and Pope, who himself tells us 'of his wig all powder and all snuff his band,' let fly one of his keener arrows at the beaux, whose wit lay in their snuff-boxes and tweezer cases. As the men laid by, in the Georgian era, much of the magnificence of their attire, so their snuff-boxes became plainer and decidedly uglier. Rushing into an opposite extreme, the most outrageous receptacles for the precious dust were devised. Boxes in the shape of bibles, boots, shoes, toads, and coffins outraged public taste. The strangest materials were used in their construction; the public taste leaning towards relics possessing historical interest. Thus the mulberry tree planted by Shakespeare, the hull of the Royal George, in which 'brave Kempenfelt went down, with twice four hundred men,' and the deck of the Victory, on which Nelson died 'for England, home, and beauty,' have alone been supposed to supply material for snuff-boxes to an extent which, if known, must considerably weaken the faith of their possessors in their genuineness.



"Nor has snuff itself been less liable to the rule of fashion than the boxes that held it. We will give a few familiar instances. In the naval engagement of Viga, in 1703, when a large Spanish fleet was taken or destroyed, a great quantity of musty snuff was made prize of, and patriotism ran high enough to cause the 'town' for some length of time to resist all that was not manufactured to imitate the flavor from which it took its well-known name of 'musty.' Nearer to our own time, a large tobacco warehouse having been destroyed by fire, in Dublin, a poor man purchased some of the scorched or damaged stock, and manufacturing it into coarse snuff, sold it to the poorer class of snuff-takers. Forthwith capricious fashion adopted it, endowing it with fabulous qualities, and Lundy Foot's Irish Black-guard (so it was termed) filled the most fashionable boxes.

"Again, during the Peninsular campaigns, in which the light division of the British army bore so memorable a part, the mixture used by and called after its gallant leader, General Sir. Amos Norcott, had a more extensive sale than any other. When Napoleon was at Elba, and folks began to tire of legitimacy, as they soon did, it became fashionable to use snuff scented with the spirit of violet, and significantly to allude to the perfume. Garrick, when he was manager of Drury Lane Theatre, brought a mixture into fashion by using or alluding to it in one of his most famous parts. The tobacconist whom he thus favored was his under-treasurer, Hardham, whom no writer about snuff should omit to notice. He was a great favorite with Garrick, whom in his turn he almost revered. One of Hardham's most important duties was to number the house from a hole in the curtain above the stage; and it is amusing to fancy the little tobacconist, snuff-box in hand, calmly watching the pit fill, or from his elevated position admiring the histrionic talents of his gifted patron. His shop in Fleet street is also memorable. It was the general resort of theatrical men and tyros, who sought to reach the manager through his subordinates, and his little back parlor witnessed the debut of many who afterwards gained applause from larger, though not more exacting audiences.

"Her Majesty Queen Charlotte has bequeathed her name to a once favorite mixture, and George the Fourth has some slight chance of being remembered by the famous 'Prince's Mixture,' which was so popular when it was the fashion to admire and imitate that gifted individual. It would be a grateful but almost an impossible task to enumerate the kings, soldiers, lawyers, poets and actors who had sought from and found in the snuff-box comfort and inspiration. Prominent among the rulers of the earth who have acknowledged the pleasing influence of snuff is Frederick the Great. His snuff-box was the pocket of the long waistcoats of that period, in which he kept large quantities loose—a dirty habit, which Napoleon, who was a great plagiarist, adopted. It would be easy to draw out a famous list of literary names attached to snuff, beginning with Dryden, who was particular enough to manufacture his own mixture, and selfish enough to preserve the secret of its excellence, with a view, probably, of enhancing the value of the pinch from his box, for which the beaux and wits at Will's intrigued.

"In the pulpit, at the bar, and on the stage, snuff has been equally valuable in adding to the persuasive eloquence and talent of its patrons. By the female portion of human-kind it was at one time pretty generally taken, nor was it uncommon for young and even pretty women to offer and accept a pinch in public. After the gentle sex had to a great extent given up the habit, some strong minded females were to be found who retained it. Mrs. Siddons, when she came off the stage after dying hard, as Desdemona, or harrowing the hearts of her audience by her representation of Jane Shore, could composedly ask those around for a pinch of the precious restorative. When we consider the beneficial influence which snuff has exerted over mankind generally, we cannot help regretting that its virtues were not sooner known.

"For we put forth the proposition seriously, that its effect upon the world has been to render it more humane and even-tempered, and that had the western hemisphere discovered the tobacco plant earlier, historians would have had more pleasant events to chronicle. For instance, it is not impossible—nay, most probable—that the fate of Rome, discussed by the Triumvirate over their snuff-boxes, would have been different. Is it likely that, under the humanizing influence of mutual pinches, Antony would have asked for, or Augustus resigned, the head of Cicero to his bloodthirsty colleague; or that the other details of the conscription which deluged the streets of Rome with the blood of her best citizens, would have been agreed to? Again, can any one imagine Charles the Ninth and his evil counsellors plotting the massacre of St. Bartholomew over pinches of the soothing dust? Is it probable that the High Court of Justiciary would have entitled its royal martyr to a special service in the Book of Common Prayer, if its deliberation had been inspired by the kindly snuff which since that time has so often softened the rigor of the law? My hypothesis may seem an absurd one, but history supports it.

"When Charles the Second introduced snuff into general use, men's hands had scarcely adapted themselves to more peaceable occupations than cutting their neighbors' throats, and the ashes of a long and bitter civil war needed little fanning to break into a blaze again; and yet, for forty years of misgovernment the nation kept its temper. How can this forbearance be accounted for? Was it that circumstances no longer called for as stern and as effectual remedies as before? No. Was the second Charles one whit more desirable than the first of that ilk? Was Clarendon more liked than Stafford? Was Russell's head of less consequence than Prynne's ears? No. Again, wrongs as grievous as those which Hampden had died in resisting were to be avenged, but in a milder, better fashion; for mankind had in the meantime learned to take snuff. Much of the haste and irritation which had previously led to blows discharged itself in a good-natured sneeze. Snuff made men forbearing, even jocular over their wrongs. Who can doubt that the revolution which ended in placing William of Orange on his father-in-law's throne owed its bloodless character not a little to the influence of snuff. We read of difficulties in its course, which, fifty years previously, would inevitably have led to bloodshed, being easily, almost humorously surmounted. The plagued nation effected a revolution over its snuff-boxes in the happiest conceivable manner.

"Having ventured so far I am inclined to put forward a yet higher claim which snuff has upon our gratitude, and to hint that the great deeds of great men who were snuff-takers may be traced by a chain of reasoning—slight, yet conclusive—to this dearly prized luxury. The hackneyed saying that time is money, or money's worth, has more truth in it than most of the fallacies which are supposed to regulate our conduct. The most important events of our lives often hinge on moments. A moment to stifle passion, to summon reflection, to plunge into the past and bring up a buried memory, to consider results, is often of the utmost consequence, and this valued moment the pinch of snuff insures, when, without it, delay would be simply embarrassment. The pinch of snuff, taken at the right instant, secures an important reprieve, during which the unpleasant question may be evaded, the hasty reply reconsidered, or an angry repartee thought better of, while the same time gained serves to improve the diplomatist's equivoque, to point the orator's satire, and polish the wit's mot. In a word, its use on important occasions affords, to every one who needs them, better means of acting upon Talleyrand's mischievous yet clever aphorism—that language is useful rather to conceal than to express our thoughts. Moreover, the action necessary in conveying the tempting graces to their destination has not unfrequently been found useful. It employs the hasty hand that may itch to take illegal vengeance for fancied insults; it serves to hide the angry twitching mouth and passionately expanding nostrils, to give a natural expression to changes of the countenance which would otherwise indicate emotion, and to parry attention till reason has been summoned to supplant passion.

"It is denied (in a rather irritating way sometimes) that the subject of our article has any beneficial influence upon the intellects of its patrons. We are not about to claim for it any such exalted qualities, but we may be allowed to mention a fact or so which entitles it to some respect medicinally. As we have before stated, in its early days it was considered to possess powerful healing qualities, and even now is found of use in cases of headache and weak sight. It was also supposed valuable in cases of heaviness and obtuseness of intellect. Is it, therefore unreasonable to presume that it may have had some share in gaining for our brethren beyond the Tweed that shrewdness of national character which has become proverbial?



"The specimens which came in the reign of James I., southward, did not command much respect or admiration from our countrymen; indeed they were the bulls at which every satirist hurled his shafts, and blunt must have been that one which did not pierce some potent folly of language or manner. The town rang with anecdotes of their rags, beggary, and quarrels; ballad-singers made merry at their expense, and the stage resounded with uncomplimentary allusions. Indeed, in one of the most popular plays of that period, the king himself was not spared, and the actors (Ben Jonson among them) had very nearly lost their ears for their boldness. Nor was it at least for a hundred and fifty years after this period that the Scotch became noted for that enterprise and talent which now distinguish them.

"We do not deny that the union may have developed their traits, but it is clear that within that time snuff had become a national stimulant. To the observer of men and manners there is something very characteristic in the various fashions in which the pinch of snuff is taken. 'The exercise of the snuff-box,' as it was once termed, was an acknowledged science, but few were the great proficients who could mutely express their feelings by its aid. We have not space to run through all its exercise, but we may mention the 'pinch military,' which Frederick, and after him, Napoleon practiced inhaling snuff copiously, and with much waste, as though it were human life they were throwing away; the 'pinch malicious,' of which Pope was perfect master; the 'pinch dictatorial,' which burly Jonson established; the 'pinch sublimely contemptuous,' such as Reynolds took when some travelling virtuoso hinted at excellence away from Leicester-square, and ruffled his complacent vanity; and, above all, the 'pinch polite,' which Talleyrand understood so well.

"From snuff to sneezing is but a step, which we purpose taking before we bring this cursory article to a close. The act of sneezing appears to have been variously regarded at various stages of the world's history, but from the earliest times of which we have any authentic record, it has been the customs of those around to give vent to a short benediction immediately upon its commission. The Robbins considering themselves bound to find a reason for this universal custom, and being hard pressed, gave the somewhat incomprehensible explanation that, previous to Jacob, man sneezed but once in his lifetime, and then immediately before death; so that those around, warned of his imminent journey, hastened to wish it a good termination. How it was that Jacob instituted a new order of things we are not told, but as a proof of the truth of their assertion they give the fact that in all nations of the earth a similar custom will be found existing.

"Strangely enough this assertion was corroborated by the first colonists of America, who found the habit to be in common use amongst the aboriginal tribes. The Greeks and Romans certainly had a similar habit, but far from attaching any ill-omen to the sneeze they regarded it as of good augury. Thus Catullus assures us that when Cupid upon a memorable occasion sneezed, all:

'The little loves that waited by Bowed and blessed the augury.

And in the 'Life of Themistocles,' Plutarch informs his readers that sneezing by the General on the eve of a battle was regarded as a certain sign of conquest. Strangely enough we find that in comparatively modern times, the custom of giving expression to good wishes when a friend sneezed was attributed to the fearful plague which periodically swept over Europe. Sneezing was one of its first and most dangerous symptoms, and those who were by, as they gathered their robes about them and fled from their doomed fellow-creature, would ejaculate a quick 'God bless you,' hurriedly invoking from a more merciful quarter the aid they feared to give. Violent sneezing was not only among the first, but was one of the last fatal signs of that fearful scourge, and was often too rapidly followed by death to give time for more than a short benediction. Anyhow, the custom still exists and one of the most pleasant reminiscences attached to the first pinch of snuff is the chorus of hearty good wishes of sympathizing friends which follows upon the inevitable sneeze."



The variety of taste in snuff is accounted for by the proverb, "So many men to so many noses." Highland gentlemen of every degree are mostly fond of Gillespie; while operatives from the Lowlands generally prefer plain Scotch. When two Highlanders meet, they usually exchange a pinch of snuff, mutually preeing the contents of their mulls, while their colleys, (dogs) after a fashion of their own, take a reciprocal sniff of each other. Cuba is the favorite of the gentlemen of the stock exchange; the tradesman's box usually contains rappee; high dried Irish is grateful to those who love to feel the taste of snuff in their throat. Sea-faring men seldom take snuff: a sailor with a snuff-box is as rarely to be met with as a sailor without a knife.

The history of the rise and progress of snuff-taking abounds in incidents and anecdotes, among the most curious of all that relate to the various modes of using the weed. Though once the most popular and fashionable manner of using tobacco it now falls far behind the other and more common and more popular forms of indulging in the herb. In France and Spain the introduction of tobacco ushered in this form of using it, and to inhale a few grains of the pungent dust was the delight of polished and favored courtiers who regardless of the forms royalty patronized and gave sanction to the custom. Thus its use in a short time became popular all over Europe and gave unlimited scope for the satirist and dramatist to ridicule the habit. In spite, however, of frown and ridicule this ancient custom though not now as popular or as fashionable, still claims many sincere votaries and doubtless will as long as the plant is cultivated or used in any form.



CHAPTER IX.

CIGARS.

"The poet may sing of the leaf of the rose, And call it the purest and sweetest that blows; But of all the leaves that ever were tried, Give me the tobacco leaf rolled up and dried."

The smoking of cigars is now considered the best as it is the most fashionable mode of using the weed. The word cigar is from the Spanish cigarro, and signifies a cylindrical roll of tobacco leaves, made of short pieces or shreds of the leaves divested of the stem and wound about with a binder, and enveloped in a portion of the leaf known by the name of wrapper—acute at one end and truncated at the other. In the East Indies a sort of cigar called cheroot is also made with both ends truncated. The smoking of tobacco in the form of cigars is doubtless the most general as well as the most ancient mode of its use. When Columbus landed in Hispaniola, the sailors saw the natives smoking the leaves of a plant, "the perfume of which was fragrant and grateful." But while cigars are of very ancient origin in the West Indies, they were not generally known in Europe until the beginning of the Nineteenth Century. In fact, of all the various works on gastronomy and the pleasures of the table, written and published from 1800 to 1815, not one speaks of this now indispensable adjunct of a good dinner. Even Britlat-Savarin, in his Physiologie du Gout, entirely ignores tobacco and all its distractions and charms. Benzo gives the following account of the manufacture of a cigar in Hispaniola:—

"They take a leafe from the stalks of their great bastard corn (which we commonly called Turkie—wheat) together with one of these tobacco-leaves and fold them up together like a coffin of paper, such as grocers make to put spices in, or like a small organ-pipe. Then putting one end of the same coffin to the fire, and holding the other end in their mouths, they draw their breath to them. When the fire hath once taken at the pipe's end, they draw forth so much smoke that they have their mouth, nose, throat, and head full of it; and, as if they tooke a singular delight therein they never leave supping and drinking till they can sup no more, and thereby loose their breath and their feeling."

Sahagun, in his "History of New Spain," speaks of the natives as using the leaves of tobacco rolled into cigars, which they ignite and smoke in tubes of tortoise-shell or silver. The following article from the New York Times contains much valuable information in regard to cigars, especially Havanas:



"It is perfectly safe to say that there is more money spent every day in New York for cigars than for bread," (doubted.) "From the fine gentlemen, who buy their cigars at Delmonico's, or get them direct from the importers, down to the little barefoot boys in the streets, who buy theirs from the Chinamen at the corners or pick up the stumps that are thrown away, all smoke. In some countries pipes and cigarettes are made to do duty by the poorer classes, but in New York cigars seem to be almost invariably preferred. Now, while there is nothing better, in the way of something to smoke, than a first-class Havana cigar, there is nothing nastier than some of the cheap abominations made in that shape in New York. To the truth of this last proposition, anyone will readily testify who has ever been so unfortunate as to have had to ride from Harlem to New York in a late smoking-car, with half a dozen roughs smoking cheap cigars on board.

"The cigars sold in this market may be divided into three classes—the imported, those made of imported tobacco, and those made of domestic tobacco. These may be again classified under many different heads, as there are many kinds and grades of each. The cheapest cigars in New York are dispensed by dilapidated Chinamen, who have little stands about the streets and markets. These are certainly the vilest cigars made anywhere in the world, and are sold from one to five cents each. Next in order come the common domestic cigars. They are sold at five cents each, or six for twenty-five cents, and are of the kind kept at the cheap refreshment stalls, lager beer saloons, and low groggeries. After these are the more pretentious home-made cigars, manufactured of selected domestic tobacco, which are sold all over the city, and in the making of which Havana 'fillers' are supposed to be used. A filler, be it known, in technical parlance means that portion of the tobacco of which the inside of the cigar is made. Price, ten to fifteen cents. Then comes the best class of cigars in which domestic tobacco is used, those which are made with clear Havana fillers and Connecticut wrappers. Fifteen cents is the price, and many are palmed off on the unwise for the real imported article. Cigars made wholly of imported Cuban tobacco come next on the list. Some of them are excellent, and compare favorably with many of the imported. They bring from fifteen to fifty cents each at the cigar stores. Last in line, but best of all, is the genuine, imported Havana cigar. Few and rare are they, and great is the price of the higher grades thereof.

"There are some places in New York where an imported cigar of a reasonable size may be bought for fifteen cents, but they are few and far between. Twenty or twenty-five cents is the price usually charged, and from that to a dollar. All the cigars made in the United States are invariably put up in imitation Havana boxes, with imitation Havana labels and brands. It is doubtful, however, whether this transparent device deceives anybody, for in accordance with the United States Internal Revenue laws, all boxes of cigars manufactured in the United States must not only bear the manufacturer's label, giving his full name and place of business, and the number of his manufactory, but they must also bear the United States inspector's brand. Before the present law was in force, and the duties on tobacco were low, this scheme may have been profitable. But why the practice is still adhered to by the manufacturers is hard to imagine, for the boxes now used, being made of imported cedar, must be very costly, and must materially increase the price of cigars. Only those of the very poorest quality are packed in white wooden boxes.



"Some people seem to smoke not because they like it, but only to be in the fashion. Some days ago the writer of this article happened to be in a cigar-store, when two well-dressed young men came in and asked for some ten cent cigars. The clerk handed out the box, and after a critical inspection the purchaser asked: "Are these medium?' 'Yes, sir,' said the clerk. 'Then I'll take a dollar's worth.' After they had gone the writer asked the clerk what they meant by 'medium.' He said he didn't exactly know, but supposed they wanted to know whether the cigars were between strong and mild. 'I told them they were,' said he, 'because I thought they would buy if I said so, but they are all alike.' And in this connection it is very singular that although the Island of Cuba is so near to the United States and so many cigars are imported into this city, so little is known about the different sizes and brands of cigars, excepting, of course, by those in the business. It is a common thing here to see a man ask in a cigar store for a Flor del Fumar, a Figaro, or an Espanola. By this he means a cigar of a certain size, and does not seem to know that these are not the names which designate the size, but are the names of the manufactories. In Havana, were a man to ask for a Flor del Fumar, the dealer would ask him what size he wanted.

"Every box of cigars packed in Havana has, at least, six distinctive works on it. First is the brand, which is burned in the upper side of the lid of the box, with an iron made for the purpose; second the label, this bears the name and address of the manufactory; third, the mark designating the size and shape of the cigars, this is usually put on with a stencil; there are not so very many regular sizes, or vitolas, made in Havana as might be imagined, a list of them may prove interesting. These are: Damos, Entre Actos, Opera, Concha, Regalia de Concha, Londres, Londres de Corte, Regalia de Londres, Regalia Britanica, Regalia del Rey, Regalia de la Reina, Reina Victoria, Panetelos, Trabucos, Embajadores, Especiales, Imperiales, Brevos, Prensados, Cilindrados, Millar Vegueros. The Damos (Dames) as their name indicates, are meant for the ladies, and are the smallest made. The Cozadores (huntsmen) are the longest, and the Trabucos (blunderbusses) the fattest. The Prensados (pressed) are flat, and Cilindrados (cylindrical) are so called because, when green, they are put in bundles of twenty-five, and tightly rolled in strong tissue paper, which is twisted at each end of the roll. When the cigars are dry the paper is taken off, and the bunch retains the cylindrical shape given it. The Brevos (figs) are also tied up while green, and tightly pressed. This makes them stick together something like figs, hence their name. The Vegueros (plantation) take their name from the fact that they are supposed to be made like those made on the plantations, but they are not made in the same way.

"In the Vegos (plantations) the veguero, or planter, makes his cigar of a single leaf of tobacco, which he carries ready moistened for the purpose, by rolling it on his knee. Besides the above, some fancy sizes have been adopted of late years, but they are made by only a few of the larger manufacturers in Havana. Fourth is the color mark, which is also put on in stencil. Fifth, the class mark. All the round cigars made in Havana are separated into three classes: Primera, or first; Segunda, or second; and Tercera, or third. Some manufacturers never mark any of their cigars as of the third class, not because they do not make them, but because they think they sell better without the mark. They make the first class Flor, the second Primera, and the third Segunda. Others mark all their cigars as of the first class, and indicate the classes by the color of the labels, and in this way none but the wholesale purchaser knows the secret. Sixth, the last, is the mark denoting the number of cigars in the box. This is stenciled on the side in Arabic numerals.

"A theory has obtained that cigars made in Havana, by reason of some inexplicable climatic influence, are better than those made in New York, even should they be made of tobacco from the same plantation. This may be so, but it is doubtful whether this was ever fairly tested, or, indeed, whether it was ever tested at all. The truth is that all the best tobacco grown in the island of Cuba is bought up by the heavy manufacturers in Havana. The crops of the best plantations are contracted for in advance, and the old-established firms buy from the same vegos year after year. Hence it is why their cigars are so uniform in quality. All Cuban tobacco is not good, by any means. The tobacco from the Vuelta de Arriba is not so good as that from the Vuelta de Abajo, and yet there is but little difference in their geographical position. And in the Vuelta de Abajo, a short distance makes a difference in the quality of the tobacco. Some vegos are celebrated for their good crops, while others, perhaps not a hundred yards away, do not produce good crops at all. There are many poor cigars made in Cuba, as all who have ever been there know, and all over the island the Havana cigar is deemed the best. In Havana, and, indeed, in all parts of the island, green or freshly-made cigars are preferred, and the most esteemed cigar-cases are made of carefully prepared bladders, in which the cigars are rolled to prevent the evaporation of the moisture.

"When a Cuban gentleman gives a cigar to a friend, he does not, as we do, open his case, and offer it to him to choose from but he examines its contents carefully and critically, selects the one he thinks the best and offers it. And there is a great deal more in the choice of a cigar, by selecting it on account of its outside appearance, than one not accustomed to it would suppose. A wrapper which has that which the Cubans call calidad makes the cigar much stronger than one which does not possess it. That is to say, that the wrapper which has calidad contains more essential oil, is denoted by an abundance of small pustules on the surface of the leaf, and by a general rich, oily appearance. As a proof of the foregoing proposition, it is only necessary to know how cigars are made. A lot of tobacco is worked up into say 50,000. After they are all made, they are turned over to be assorted, according to color and class, and are packed and marked. The fillers are all alike, it is the wrappers that make the difference. To assort the colors a very, correct eye is required, and those who do this part of the work make better wages than those who make the cigars.

"The value of cigars does not increase in direct ratio with their size, for owing to the difficulty in getting good wrappers for the larger kinds, the expense of their manufacture is much increased. Upon one occasion, in Havana, a manufacturer received an order for a thousand cigars intended for the Queen of Spain's husband, Don Francisco de Asis, which he agreed to make for $1,000. They were delivered in due time, and packed in a richly-mounted cedar chest, were sent to the royal recipient. They were magnificent cigars, of the cazadores size, all of the same color, and so smoothly made as to look as if they had been turned out of hard wood instead of rolled tobacco. They were placed on exhibition for a few days before they were sent to Spain, and a gentleman who saw them, wishing to make a present to some dignitary, asked the manufacturer to make him a like number at the same price. To his surprise, the order was refused. The manufacturer said he could not do it for the money. His explanation was that it was not the actual cost of the tobacco and labor of making them, but it was on account of the trouble and expense met with in selecting the wrappers. He said he had to pick over thousands of bales before he could secure a sufficient number of the proper length, color, and fineness.

"Some two years ago there was a story of a Cuban cigar-dealer in Broadway, who selected cigars for his more favored customers by ear. It was said that he put the cigar to his ear, and listened intently for a moment, and by the cracking of the tobacco was enabled to judge of its quality. This was a good advertising dodge, but in practice it was all nonsense. None but that wily Cuban ever heard of such a mode of trying a cigar. In the Island of Cuba that which we call a cigar is called a tabaco (a tobacco) and when it is required to discriminate between the manufactured and unmanufactured article it is called tabaco torcido, or rolled tobacco. This, however, is only necessary when used in the plural. In Mexico a cigar is called a puro, and in Peru[62] and some of the other Spanish American countries it is called a cigarro puro, in contradistinction to the cigarro de papel, or cigarette. Cigarettes in Cuba are called cigarros, and their consumption is enormous. Strange as it may appear, there are some confirmed smokers in Cuba who never use cigars at all, but confine themselves to cigarettes. To the New Yorker it looks curious to see a great, bearded man smoking a tiny cigarette; and, indeed were he to smoke his cigarette as the New Yorker would smoke his cigar, it would be labor lost, so far as getting any effect of the tobacco was concerned. But the cigarette smoker inhales the greater part of the smoke, it goes directly into his lungs, and into contact with a large surface of mucous membrane, and, indeed, with the blood itself. Were the New York cigar-makers to smoke a cigarette in the same way it would make him so giddy that he would be compelled to give it up long before it was consumed. That the smoke does go into the lungs is proved by the fact that a cigarette smoker can inhale the smoke and exhale it again after drinking a glass of water."

[Footnote 62: Ballaert says that the consumption of cigars in Peru is enormous. "An old fisherman on being asked how he amused himself when not at his labors replied, 'Why I smoke; and as I have consumed 40 paper cigars a day for the last 50 years, which cost me one rial each will you have the goodness to tell me how many I have smoked, and how much I have expended for tobacco?'"]



All tobacco grown upon the island of Cuba is not of the finest quality; the majority of it is far inferior to the best Mexican coast tobacco. The value of the tobacco lands of this last mentioned country has not been fully developed. The variety of soil, exposure, climate, and atmospheric influences are greater than can possibly be in Cuba, and when the best is discovered, combining all the requisites, which undoubtedly will be the case with an increased culture of the plant, it will be found to be equal to the Vuelta Abogo of Cuba, and much more extensive. The subject of tobacco lands, evidently, is not well understood in Mexico, as it must be, from great experience, in Cuba. All of these varieties of lands and circumstances exist in Mexico, and it is safe to predict that, at some day, this country will stand pre-eminent over all others in this industry.

We extract the following from the Tobacco Leaf in regard to cigar-making in Cuba:—

"The rule is that a cigar-maker devotes all his ingenuity and diligence to one class of goods. For example, one workman makes only Londres; another only Regalias; another only Milores Communes; and so on. In the Cuban's factory the operatives are allowed to smoke as many cigars as they like when at work; and to take home with them, when they leave work in the evening, five cigars each. The immigration of Chinese laborers into Cuba has modified, and must further modify, the labor market there. In the cigarette factories at Havana, Chinese workmen are almost exclusively employed. Though objectionable for many of their moral habits, these workmen are nevertheless docile, ingenious, laborious, and contented."

A writer, alluding to the manufacture of cigars, says:—

"The colors or strengths are Amarillo Claro, bright yellow; Amarillo Obscuro, dark yellow; Claro, bright; Colorado Claro, bright red; Colorado, red; Colorado Obscuro, dark red; Colorado Maduro, red-ripe or mellow; Maduro, ripe or mellow; Maduro Obscuro, dark ripe or mellow; Pajizo Claro, bright straw-colored; Pajizo, straw-colored; Pajizo Obscuro, dark straw-colored; Fuerte, strong or heavy; Entre Fuerte, rather strong or heavy; Flajo, light. Then there are the indications of the qualities:—Superfine; Firo, not quite so fine; Flor, finest or firsts; Superior, next, or seconds; Buenos, next, or thirds. The cigar has a notable history. First has to be determined the part of the plant from which it is taken; then the part of the leaf from which it is taken, the tobacco being best which is furthest away from the root or middle of the leaf. One elaborate process follows another for the perfection of a work of art—for as such we must regard a cigar."

Hazard, in his admirable work on Cuba, devotes considerable space to cigars, their manufacture, varieties, and use, in which he speaks of the various brands as follows:—

"The brands known as 'Yara Mayau,' and the 'Guisa,' are perhaps the most celebrated made upon the Island. Of the 'Yara,' which has some considerable reputation, particularly in the London market, I confess I cannot speak favorably. Cigars that I smoked made from this leaf, and which are much smoked in the vicinity of Santiago de Cuba, I found had a peculiar saline taste which was very unpleasant, as also a slight degree of bitterness; many smokers, however, become very fond of this flavor. When I state that in Havana alone there are over one hundred and twenty-five manufacturers of cigars, it will readily be understood there must be a great many inferior cigars made even in Cuba. Havana may be called the 'City of cigars,' from its reputation and the immense number of factories there are in it for the manufacture of cigars, from the smallest shop opening on the street, employing three or four hands to the immense fabricos erected expressly for this purpose, and employing five or six hundred.



"Let not any one imagine, then, that because he is in Havana he will get no poor cigars, for a greater mistake can not be made, for just as vile trash can there be purchased as any where; and it appeared to me that in buying, from time to time in different fabricos, a few cigars it was rarely I found a really good one. It behooves, then, every lover of a good cigar to make himself familiar with the best makers and brands, and to purchase those, and those only, that suit his taste. To the traveler in Havana, this is easy enough, as he can there buy sample boxes from any of the factories and of any of the brands. There are, in addition to these hundreds of other cigar factories, some of which, such as Cabargos, Figaros, Luetanos, Victorias, etc., are first-class, three or four at least in whose cigars every smoker may have perfect confidence, the brands of which are known all over the world. These are: Cabanos, Uppmann and Partagas; for whose brands, perhaps, one pays something more, but has always the satisfaction of finding them good. To the kindness of the gentlemen connected with some of these factories I am indebted for most of the information in this article, and particularly to Senor Don Avulmo G. del Valle, the present proprietor of the Cabanos Factory, who was good enough to show me through his establishment, carefully explaining to me its peculiarities. As the process of manufacture and description of grades and qualities are the same with all the best makers, I give here a detailed history of this factory and its products.

"The factory for Cabanos cigars has been established seventy-two years the founder of it being Don Francisco Cabanos, his son, Don de P. Cabanos, succeeding him, to whom has succeeded his son-in-law, Senor del Valle, the present proprietor and director of the factory. When it was founded, the cigars were sold to the public in bundles of twenty, only amounting to a total number per year, of four or five hundred thousand cigars, the sales of which kept constantly increasing until 1826, when there were sold two millions. At this period the demand for exportation commenced, increasing each year until 1848, when the number sold amounted to three and a half millions. At this time, the present director came in charge, and increased the sale to eight millions per year, until, in 1866, the total sales by this one house only, amounted to the enormous number of sixteen million cigars, which went to different parts of the world. The tobacco manipulated in this factory is, with some few exceptions, that grown upon plantations in the Vuelta Abojo, with the proprietors of which Senor del Valle has a special contract for their product. The most noted of these places are known as 'La Lena,' 'San Juan aj Martin,' 'Los Pilotos,' 'Rio Hondo.' The firm also own three vegas, as do also Partagas, Uppmann, and others, in a greater or less degree. The amount raised upon these vegas in connection with the Cabanos Factory, amounts to five thousand bales, of from first to eighth quality, leaving the most inferior qualities, which amount to about one thousand bales, for exportation, the factory not using such common grades. It is a custom of the manufacturers to keep a supply of the best qualities always on hand from year to year, in order that, should the tobacco crop, in any one year, be bad, the reputation of the house can be maintained by using the good tobacco in the store. The factory is a large stone building, opposite the Canipo de Moste, in which all the operations connected with cigar making are carried on (excepting the manufacture of boxes) by over five hundred operatives, all males. The following is the process of manufacture:

"Arrived at the factory, the tobacco bales, carefully packed and wrapped in palm leaves, are kept in a cool, dark, place on the first floor, being divided off into classes according to quality and value, which latter varies from twenty to four hundred dollars per bale of two hundred pounds. When wanted, the bales are opened, the manojas and gabillos are separated, and the latter carried in their dry state to the moistening room. Here are a number of men whose business it is to place the leaves, for the purpose of moistening and softening them, into large barrels in which is a solution of saltpetre in water; this done, the water is poured off, and other workmen spread out the leaves with their hands upon the edges of the barrels, ridding them as much as possible, of any surplus water; after which, the leaves, from being moistened, unfold very easily, and, with care, without tearing. The stem is then taken out, the process being known as disbalillar. These stems, with the refuse of other tobacco, are sometime used as filling for the commonest kind of cigars. The filling is known as tripa, the very best being selected, like the leaf, for the best cigars. Now comes the maker, and supplying himself with a handful of leaf (copa) for wrappers, and a lot of the tripa for filling or really making the body of the cigar itself he carries it to a little table, and spreading the wrapper upon the table, cuts with a short knife the different portions of the leaf. This is a very nice operation, requiring skill, knowledge, and experience; for it is in this operation that the different qualities of tobacco are separated, the outside of the leaf being generally the best; next that, another quality; and that portion adjoining the stem the worst.



"The general sorting of the tobacco is done by hands of great experience and judgment, who are the highest in consideration in the factories, some of them receiving large pay; thus for instance, the official escojedor, or chooser, gets from five to seven dollars (gold) per day, and the torcedores, or twisters, from two to four, the workmen being paid so much per thousand cigars, generally from two to four dollars. To show how very careful the maker must be in cutting out the leaf to make the most of it: Mr. del Valle was explaining to me the process of manufacture, and directed the maker to cut the leaf. This the man did drawing his knife in the manner denoted by the dotted lines in the engraving. This it appears was not making the most of the fine part of the leaf, for Mr. del Valle, annoyed, took the knife himself, and after rating the maker soundly for his carelessness, showed him how to cut it properly, as defined by the black line, the difference being, as far as I could judge, a slight inequality of color between the two parts. The manufacture of the cigar is very simple. The cigar maker, being seated before a low work table, which has raised ledges on every side except that nearest him, takes a leaf of tobacco, spreads it out smoothly before him, and cuts it as in the drawing. He then lays a few fragments of tobacco (tripa) in the centre or a leaf strip and rolls the whole into the shape of a cigar, and taking then a wrapper, rolls it spirally around the cigar. If the workman is skillful, he makes it of just the right length and size, without any trimming of the knife. The cigars are assorted, counted, and done up in bundles of generally twenty-five each, and then packed in the boxes, ready for market, under their different names of Londres, Regalias, etc. These names are generally understood to have the same meaning throughout the trade, the 'Vegueros,' for instance, being the plantation cigars, made at the regas, and much esteemed by smokers, though they are rarely to be met with for sale, or, if so, at an exhorbitant price. The 'Regalia Imperial,' the finest and best, is nearly seven inches long, the price varying from one hundred and fifty to three hundred dollars per thousand (gold). The 'Regalia' is not so large but fine, the 'Trabuco,' short and thick; the 'Londres,' the most convenient in shape, and most smoked in this country and England; the 'Dama' the small sized one used by ladies(?) or by men between acts of the opera (entr' operas). There are also other names which each factory has for some particular kinds. Artificial flavors are given to cigars, when some particular taste is to be satisfied, by the use of flavoring extracts. Each of the above names has different qualities, as:

Londres 'superfine' the very best of that size (delicious). " 'fino,' not quite so fine. " 'flor,' finest, or firsts. " 'superior,' next, or seconds. " 'buenos,' next, or thirds.

Again, these different qualities have different colors, known as: 'maduro,' strongest; 'oscuro,' strong (dark); 'colorado,' medium; 'claro,' mild; 'Brevors,' means pressed. Thus, supposing one wanted a good cigar to suit his taste, he would perhaps order: 'Partagas' (maker), 'londres' (size), 'flor' (quality), 'Colorado' or 'oscuro' (strength), and he would get a good cigar, nice size, best quality, not too strong, or too mild.

"I must confess to a weakness for the Uppmann cigars, which I have found, without exception, to be good, and which have a fine reputation throughout the West Indies. A millionaire need not want a better cigar to smoke than their 'Londres superfine,' at sixty dollars (gold) per thousand, in Havana, or their 'Cazadores,' at fifty dollars. Partagas cigars of course, every one knows are good; and he keeps generally pretty well sold up, but fills orders as they come in. For a new experience, one of his 'Regalio Reyno flor,' is something to try, even if they do cost out there eighty-five dollars, gold.

"In all the factories they make about the following rates: For every order of ten thousand, costing fifty dollars per thousand, five per cent. discount is allowed. Less than five thousand will pay five dollars extra. I should, perhaps, mention that no distinction is made to dealers, the only advantage they have over the private buyer is, that they are enabled to get the discount for large lots. The absurd notion so prevalent with us, that the Cubans only smoke their cigars green, is an error, since the leaf is entirely dried in the sun before being touched by the manufacturer. The Cubans are very particular indeed to preserve the aroma and fragrance of the cigars, by keeping them in wrappers of oiled and soft silks; it is, in fact, quite a sight to see with what ceremony some of these are produced at gentlemen's tables, with much unction, like the ushering in of old wine. My chapter on cigars would be incomplete did I fail to note the beautiful and courteous way in which all Cubans no matter of what position, whether the exquisite at the club, or the portero at the door, ask you for a light. 'Do me the favor Senor?' and you present your cigar, the lighted end towards the speaker. He takes the cigar delicately between his thumb and fore-finger, lights his own, and then, with a quick, graceful motion, turns yours in his fingers, presenting you, with another wave, the mouth end, makes you a hand salute, utters his gracios, and leaves you studying out the 'motions' and thinking what a charming thing is national politeness."

In the selection of leaves for the manufacture of cigars in the factories only the large fine ones are used for Regalias, Imperiales, or Medios Regalias; and also for Cazadores, Panetelos, Imperiales, Caballeros, and so on; the smaller fine leaves for Panetelos and Londres; the dark inferior leaves for Canones. The commonest tobacco goes to form the Milores Communes; the worst is converted into cigars which are generally pressed flat, and known as Prinsados. For the smallest kind of Londres and for Damos, a proportionally small leaf is employed.

In Cuba and Luzon, one of the Philippine Islands, is found one of the largest factories for cigars in the world. In Manilla there are three factories where 7,000 families and 1,200 males are employed: one in Cavite, in which 5,000 operatives, mostly females, are engaged; and one in Malabar, which gives employment to about 2,000 more, also females. The tobacco is worked into both cigars and cheroots both of which have a variety of shapes. In both Manilla and Havana the custom of smoking is universal and one rarely meets with any of the male sex without a cigar between his lips.

A writer speaking of the universality of the custom says:

"In Havana, the custom of smoking is a universal one. There, young and old indulge freely in the use of the weed, dividing their attention pretty equally between the cigar and the cigarette. Even the ladies of the better class in many instances indulge; though not to so great an extent as is commonly reported."

"Smoking in Cuba" says an American writer, "is like the habit of making shoes in Lynn, Massachusetts, everybody smokes!—in the house, and by the way; in the cars, and on horseback; everywhere, and at all times. You meet whole regiments of youngsters, from six to eight years of age, with black beaver hats, tail-coats, and canes, each with a cigar, nearly his own size, in his mouth. You feel like putting the miniature dandies into the water of the next fountain basin, which shallow as it is, would fully, suffice to drown the largest of them."



You have a right to accost any one smoking in the street, however much may be his superiority or inferiority to yourself, and to ask a light for your cigar; even negroes hatless and shirtless, thus address well-dickied gentlemen, and vice versa. Refuse to take a cigar with a Cuban, and you refuse his friendship. The negroes cannot work at all without their quota of cigars; "and looking out of the windows of a room in that magnificent hotel 'El Telegrafo,' the writer remembers to have caught a glimpse more than once of the negro women at work in the laundry, every one of whom held a long cigar in her mouth, and puffed incessantly as the clothes were manipulated upon the washboards." In Havana, as throughout Cuba, there is a cigar etiquette, to infringe any of the rules of which is construed as an insult. It is, for instance considered a breach of etiquette when you are asked for a light to hand your cigar without first knocking off the ashes. A greater breach, however, is to pass the cigar handed for you to obtain a light from, to a third party for a similar purpose; the rule is to hand back the cigar with as graceful a wave as you can command, and then if necessary, pass your own cigar to the third party.



The insult direct in cigar etiquette is for the party to whom you apply for a light, to pass on and leave you with the remains of his cigar, or to intimate to you, by word or action, that he has no further use for it, and that you can throw it away. In Cuba, where cigars are plentiful, the usual custom is, when you ask for a light, even if the party be a stranger, to pull out your case and offer him a cigar, by way of recognizing the civility in stopping to accommodate you. The Spaniards are naturally a polite people, and the stranger stepping into the Louvre and other public places of resort in Havana, is struck at once with the marked contrast in this respect to familiar gatherings elsewhere. In no place is a cigar more enjoyable than in Havana. Seated upon the roof of one of the large hotels in that city in a bright moonlight night, within hearing of the dreamy roll on the beach: the regular throb of the sea, lulling one into quietness; the sigh of the summer breeze a lullaby to the senses; while a high-flavored prime cigar, as it wastes and floats away in air, is the fairy wand which opens the enchanted gates of Reverie and Imagination.

What need of a friend under such soothing circumstances? What need of the jolly camarade of former days to sigh back sigh for sigh, puff for puff, and wander in gentle reminiscences over the Lesbian labyrinth of the past, when Julia was most kind, or Cynthia, darling girl, delighted in the perfume of a capital havana? Here, in this quaint old city by the sea, is the place for dreams and reveries and the utter rendering of one's self up—to a good cigar. Is it not a place for reverie? Has not one with this most respectable weed, this prime havana, the concomitants of a thousand reveries? Will not one puff of that narcotic breath drowse deep all watching dragons, and make for him the sleeping beauties of his will? And, presto, there they are! and, oh! ye houris of the South, with what a smile and glance between the azure puffs! Well let me not forget myself. With a sterner morality he sees how the bending Bedouin fashions his pipe in the moistened ground; he sees the slender Indian reed with the flat bowls of Lahore and Oude, the pipe of the Anglo-eyed celestial, the red clay of Bengal, and the glittering gilded cups in which the dark-skinned races of Siam, the Malacca Isles, and the Philippines, love to enshrine their dreamy opium-haunted spirits of the weed. He sees how in the squatter's hut the old squaw sits by her hunter lord, and puffs at the corn-cob sweetness, and how by lonely ways the traveler rests and thinks of home, and in the blue smoke greets once more the faces of the loved, perhaps forever gone. He sees how the Esquimaux, with his hollow Walrus-tooth, makes bearable the stifling squalor of his den; or, sterner and graver still, some item of historic lore mingles rudely with his dreams, and elbows sharply the airy spirits of his smoke-engendered thoughts. Softly tremble in the delicate blue mist and the azure spirals from his old Virginia clay—the domes of a sea-bathed city. Loftily pierce the tall white minarets into the quivering heavens, while the solemn cypress throws its shade below. Before him, silent-paced as in a dream, files the weird array of Arab camels, bowing their long necks tufted with crimson braids, and measuring the brown sands of the desert with ghost-like tread. 'Tis the moon of Egypt and the waters of the Nile; 'tis the palm-bough waves for him; and women, free-limbed, with flashing eyes, and antique water-vases on their heads, move past him from the low-rimmed shadowy wells. And he sees them there and smiles.



He sees on beach by the sea the summer idler sitting beneath the jutting rock, gazing far out upon the sea, yet ignoring the white sails that pass up and down before him, as well as the open volume upon his knee, while his thoughts float outward and upward with the graceful wreaths of smoke that encircle his head; and if of a practical turn, he listlessly wonders why, if his own delightful land furnishes some twentieth of the whole Tobacco produce of the world, and does honor to her native weed by being its mightiest consumer, why, in the name of all disasters, the product is so dear—ay, doubly dear? And thus as his pipe burns low, a hundred other statistics; then, knocking out his whitened ashes on the floor, he reads sedately (his pipe being out) that the "Tobacco plant furnishes ashes to the amount of one-fourth of its bulk, being a much greater proportion than that of any other vegetable product," and, moreover, that "Tobacco exhausts the soil at the ratio of fourteen tons of wheat to one of Tobacco!" Oh, base insinuation! But, as he relights his pipe, and the graceful vapor circles in fresh buoyancy and grace before him, he only, in his contented mind, retains that one supreme expression—"One ton of Tobacco!" Ah,

"Think of it, picture it Now, if you can!"

From "A Paper of Tobacco,"[63] we extract the following humorous description of Yankee cigar smokers, which to a certain extent is true to life, but like most of the articles descriptive of American life by English Authors, who travel in America and write a book afterwards, it is exaggerated or overdrawn:

[Footnote 63: London, 1839.]



"The Americans, who pride themselves on being the fastest-going people on the 'versal globe'—who build steamers that can out-paddle the sea-serpent and breed horses that can trot faster than an ostrich can run—are, undoubtedly, entitled to take precedence of all nations as consumers of the weed. The sedentary Turk, who smokes from morn to night, does not, on an average, get through so much tobacco per annum, as a right slick, active, go-ahead Yankee, who thinks nothing, 'upon his own relation,' of felling a wagon-load of timber before breakfast, or of cutting down a couple of acres corn before dinner. The Americans, it is to be observed, generally smoke cigars; and tobacco in this form burns very fast away in the open air, more especially when the consumer is rapidly locomotive, whether upon his own legs, the back of a horse, the top of a coach, the deck of a steamboat, or in an open railway carriage. The habit of chewing tobacco is also prevalent in 'the States,' nor is it, as in Great Britain and Ireland, almost entirely confined to the poorer classes. Members of the House of Representatives and of the Senate, doctors, judges, barristers, and attorneys chew tobacco almost as generally as the laboring classes in the old country. Even in a court of justice, more especially in the Western States, it is no unusual thing to see judge, jury, and the gentlemen of the bar, all chewing and spitting as liberally as the crew of a homeward-bound West Indiaman. It must indeed be confessed that Brother Jonathan loves tobacco 'not wisely but too well,' and that the habits which are induced by his manner of using it are far from 'elegant.' The truth is, he neither smokes nor chews like a gentleman; he lives in a land of liberty, and takes his tobacco when and where he pleases. He spits as freely as he smokes and chews—upon the carpet or in the fire-place—for he is not particular as to where he squirts his copious saliva, and does not think with the late Dr. Samuel Parr, that a spitting-box is a necessary article of household furniture. The free-born citizen of the States laughs at the aristocratic restrictions imposed on smoking in England, where, on board of the numerous steamboats that ply on the Thames, conveying the pride of the city to Gravesend and Margate, no smoking is allowed abaft the funnel, and where, in public-houses ashore, no gentleman is permitted to smoke in the parlor before two o'clock in the afternoon. A pipe of tobacco, or a cigar, after a day's hard exercise, whether mental or bodily, and after the cravings of hunger and thirst are appeased, may be fairly ranked amongst the most delightful and most harmless of all earthly luxuries. It fills the mind with pleasing visions, and the heart with kindly feelings. A hard-working laborer, smoking by the side of his hearth at night, presents a perfect picture of quiet enjoyment. I see him now in my mind's eye. He is seated in an old high-backed, cushionless arm-chair, but an easy one, nevertheless, to him, who from dawn till sunset, has been engaged in ploughing, thrashing, ditching, or mowing. With one leg thrown over the other, he quietly reclines backward, and with an expression of perfect mental composure, he gazes on the smoke that ascends from his pipe. There is a sentiment-exciting power[64] in the smoke of tobacco when perceived by the eye, as well as a pleasing sedative effect when inhaled; and those smokers who have any doubt of the fact should take a pipe with their eyes closed. A person who smokes with his eyes shut cannot very well tell whether his cigar is lighted or not. How soothing is a pipe or a cigar to a wearied sportsman, on his return to his inn from the moors! As he sits quietly smoking, he thinks of the absent friends whom he will gratify with presents of grouse; and, in a state of perfect contentment with himself and all the world, he determines to give all his game away. Full of such kindly feelings, he retires to bed; but, alas, with day-light, when the effect of the tobacco has subsided, the old leaven of selfishness prevails, and his good intentions are abandoned. 'Mary,' said an old Cumberland farmer to his daughter, when she was once asking him to buy her a new beaver, 'why dost thou always tease me about such things when I'm quietly smoking my pipe?' 'Because ye are always best-tempered then, feyther,' was the reply. 'I believe, lass, thou's reet,' rejoined the farmer; 'for when I was a lad, I remember that my poor feyther was just the same; after he had smoked a pipe or twee he wad ha' gi'en his head away if it had been loose.'"

[Footnote 64: The smoke ascending from the snuff of a candle could excite a sentimental feeling in the minds of Wordsworth and Sir George Beaumont, though it seems to have had no such effect on the mind of Crabbe.—Lockhart's Life of Sir Walter Scott.]

The following ode to a Cigar is no doubt familiar to many, yet will pay a re-perusal:

"And oft, mild friend, to me thou art A monitor, though still; Thou speak'st a lesson to my heart Beyond the preacher's skill.

"Thou'rt like the man of worth, who gives To goodness every day, The odor of whose virtues lives When he has passed away.

"When in the lonely evening hour, Attended but by thee, O'er history's varied page I pore, Man's fate in thine I see.

"Oft, as thy snowy column grows, Then breaks and falls away, I trace how mighty realms thus rose, Thus trembled to decay.

"Awhile, like thee, earth's masters burn, And smoke and fume around, And then like thee to ashes turn, And mingle with the ground.

"Life's but a leaf adroitly rolled, And time's the wasting breath, That, late or early, we behold Gives all to dusty death.

"From beggar's frieze to monarch's robe One common doom is passed; Sweet nature's work, the swelling globe, Must all burn out at last.

"And what is he who smokes thee now? A little moving heap, That soon, like thee, to fate must bow, With thee in dust must sleep.

"But though thy ashes downward go, Thy essence rolls on high; Thus, when my body must lie low, My soul shall cleave the sky."

In Charles Butler's "Story of Count Bismarck's Life," a good anecdote is told of the Count and his last cigar:—

"'The value of a good cigar,' said Bismarck, as he proceeded to light an excellent Havana, 'is best understood when it is the last you possess, and there is no chance of getting another. At Koeniggraetz I had only one cigar left in my pocket, which I carefully guarded during the whole of the battle as a miser does his treasure. I did not feel justified in using it. I painted in glowing colors in my mind the happy hour when I should enjoy it after the victory. But I had miscalculated my chances.' 'And what was the cause of your miscalculation?' 'A poor dragoon. He lay helpless, with both arms crushed, murmuring for something to refresh him. I felt in my pockets and found I had only gold, and that would be of no use to him. But, stay, I had still my treasured cigar! I lighted this for him, and placed it between his teeth. You should have seen the poor fellow's grateful smile! I never enjoyed a cigar so much as that one which I did not smoke.'"

In European cities juveniles offer the smoker, at every street corner, a "pipe" or a "cigar light." The following description, entitled "Light, Sir," is from an English journal, and contains much interesting information on the various modes of lighting pipes and cigars.



"''Ere y'are, sir—pipe-light, cigar-light, on'y 'ap'ny a box—'ave a light, sir.' Every smoker of the larger cities knows the cry. Every tender-hearted smoker is familiar with the appeal, by day and by night, and remembers pangs of regret he has felt when the want of ha'pence or the repletion of his match-box has prevented his much-besought response. There is no need now to enlarge upon the sufferings, the adventures, the dangers of these peripatetic juvenile trades folk, sparse of clothes and food, and full of the material which may make or mar a nation; for all this was done, and even overdone, by the graphic sensationalists of the London penny dailies when Chancellor Lowe proposed a tax on matches. We may, upon occasion, feel for the manufacturers and venders of 'lights,' but more generally we find ourselves constrained to sympathize with the purchasers of such contrivances for the ignition of pipes and cigars. The smoking of tobacco is an art; an art which, in its proper exercise, requires much care, much prudence, and not a little skill. This is a proposition which must, from its very nature, be startling to non-smokers, and surprising to many smokers. The tobacco hater (invariably an illogical creature, who hates that which he knows not) will hold up hands in amazement, and sniff with the nose in contempt, to whom reply would be superfluous.

"With the smoker the case is otherwise. A German writer recently said that the English were better smokers than the Germans; because, whereas the German smoked incessantly, without rule, system, or moderation, the English smoked with care, with slow and appreciative lovingness, and the determination not to overstep the bounds of rational enjoyment. Had he known more of English smokers, he would not have made so wild a statement; and had he known English women better, he would never have attributed to their sweet influence the fancied superiority he describes in English as compared with German smoking. In truth, the art of tobacco using is nowhere more ignored, nowhere more contemptuously neglected than in these 'favored isles.' For one man who smokes with a reason, for a purpose, or by system, you shall find a thousand who smoke without either; and the result is that those who smoke have little defense, in the general way, for their practice, while those who condemn the habit have far better grounds for their opposition than they have ever yet been able to explain. To those who do know why they use tobacco, it is well-nigh incredible that so many of their fellow-smokers should be ignorant of the properties, the uses, the abuses, of the weed they burn and the fumes in which they delight. Yet, even this is not so surprising as the fact that so few of those who smoke—smoke much, often and constantly—should be ignorant of, or indifferent to, the conditions which are necessary to their own adequate enjoyment of the weed.

"You will see a man light a cigar so carelessly that one side of the roll will burn rapidly, with prodigious fumigation and giving out a dark and offensive cloud, while the other side remains untouched by the fire, only to wither and crackle and twist into uncouth shapes, until the smoker flings the cigar away, with an accompaniment of expletives which attach rather to his own stupidity than to the piece of tobacco he has so abominably abused. You will see another with a good pipe, laden with good tobacco, well lit, blowing incessantly down the mouth-piece and the stem until the moisture introduced with his breath into the bowl of his pipe effectually prevents the tobacco from burning, and puts out the fire; and then you will hear him lament that he should have paid so good a price for a pipe so bad that it 'fouls' before he has smoked a single hour. You will see another who, while he talks to his friends, allows his tobacco to go out every three or four minutes, so that at length his mouth is sore and his palate nauseated with the combined fumes of lucifer matches, burnt paper and exhausted tobacco dust; and he inveighs against the 'cabbage-leaf which that rascally tobacconist sold him for good Shag or Cavendish.' Another knows so little of the art of smoking that he never 'stops' his pipe, and so allows the light dust of the burnt weed to fly about him in flakes and minute particles, to the permanent damage of his own and his neighbors' clothes. But in nothing is the inartistic character of English smoking so conspicuously exemplified as in the use of 'lights.' Those who form the great majority of smokers amongst the English-speaking races seem to consider that, so long as their pipes are set alight, it matters not how or from what source the light is obtained. Thus, one will place his pipe-bowl in a flame of gas, and pull away at the stem till his tobacco is on fire; another will thrust the bowl into the midst of a coal fire, and when he sees a glow in the bowl withdraw it, and contentedly puff away; another stops an obliging policeman or railway guard, and ignites his tobacco by hard pulling at the flame of an oil-lamp; another will stick the end of a choice cigar into the bowl of a pipe filled with coarsest Shag, thus ruining the flavor of his 'prime Havana' forever; while yet another will light lucifer matches, and apply the blazing brimstone to his pipe or cigar, thus saturating the whole mass with sulphurous and phosphoretic fumes, to the ruin of the weed and the injury of his own health.

"How much wiser the West Indian negro, who takes a burning stick from the wood fire, and tenderly lights his weed therewith, or joyfully brings a handful of the white-hot ashes in his thick-skinned palm, that 'massa' may fire his cigar! Or the travelling peddler or tinker, who, as he sits by the way-side, patiently wooes the sun with a 'burning-glass' till his tobacco ignites, or uses with equal prudence and skill the ancient but inimitable tinder-box.



"But this is the age of Fusees. What a name! When, in our youth, those longitudinal strips of tinder, semi-divided into innumerable transverse slips, all tipped with harmless, ignitable matter, first assumed the title, we had little notion of the atrocities which would come to be dignified by their name. This was soon after the world had been delighted by the Congreves, which drove Lucifer to the wall, and before English and German ingenuity had taught us to find 'death' in the box, as well as 'the pot.' The innocent old fusee had his faults, certainly. He would not always light; he had a bad habit of turning back on your finger-nail and burning its quick when you struck him; and he would occasionally light up, all by himself, and set fire to fifty of his fellows in your waist-coast pocket, or the tail of your best dress-coat. (Those were the days when waist-coats were gorgeous and tail-coats immense.) But what were these peccadilloes compared with the sins of the modern 'cigar-light?' 'Fusees,' forsooth! More like bomb-shells, military mines, torpedoes, and nitroglycerine trains. Who has not had them explode in his eye, on his cheek, down his neck, scarring his skin, burning holes in his coats and trousers, frightening passers-by, and doing all manner of deep-dyed devilment? Nor is this the worst. Those who will trust their skins, and their eyes, and their clothes to 'Vesuvians,' 'Flamers,' and the like, are not to be pitied; for they are more cruel to their tobacco than the fusees are to them. Our grievance is that so many engines of destructiveness and offensiveness should be so largely patronized by smokers, to their own discomfort, the ruination of their tobacco, the scandalization of gentle and simple, and the encouragement of vicious manufactures. Now, we are not going to particularize too closely, for fear of consequences. In these days, when a man may bring an action for libel because it has been said of him that he sells bad soup at a railway station, prudence is the better part of valor. But, just examine this heterogeneous pile of 'cigar-lights,' which rears its audacious head upon the table. Here are Palmers, Barbers, Farmers, Lord Lornes, Tichbornes, Bryants and Moys, Bells and Blacks, Alexandres, Bismarcks, King Williams, Napoleons, and scores of other varieties. Some light 'only on the box,' some light anywhere, some everywhere, and some nowhere. Some are on wood, some on porcelain, some on glass, some on dire deeds intent. There are vestas, safety-matches, patent flint-and-steel contrivances, with silver tubes and marvellous screws wherewith to put them out when they have served your turn. Some are excellent, many passable, still more intolerable. One of these times it may be worth while to speak of the good ones, but at present we care only to treat of those that are bad, and that briefly.